They walked over sullenly. Bard stooped and put his hands on his knees, a physical act that Kurt could scarcely believe.
“Skidmarks,” Bard said. “How did I miss them?”
“We can guess all we want,” Higgins said, “but the only way we’re going to know for sure is to ask Swaggert.”
Bard’s heavy face now glittered an amazing shade of pink. “Yeah, but first we have to find the son of a bitch.”
Birds chirped around them, reveling in the joy of a new day. As the sun cleared the edge of the earth, pouring light, the three men faced each other, suddenly unable to speak. Kurt felt a spark of dread in his gut; next to Cody Drucker’s disentombment, he couldn’t imagine anything so wrong. Doug Swaggert, it seemed, had simply vanished.
««—»»
Kurt hadn’t been to Glen’s for so long that he nearly forgot the way. Glen lived in a drab little bungalow just beyond town limits, in Annapolis. When he finally found the place, he parked the new cruiser next to Glen’s Pinto. Six bungalows formed a horseshoe shape around a communal parking oval. They all looked the same—gray and squat and forsaken, windows blank in afternoon shadow. Heaps of leaves lay still between the bungalows, crabgrass crawled out through cracks in sidewalks. Another car was parked two spaces down, a black, nameless foreign make; its sleek curves, tinted glass, and sharp-sloped front end reminded Kurt of a shark. He thought he heard its engine ticking as he walked across the cul-de-sac.
He fastened his portable to his belt, then rapped gently on Glen’s storm door. Glen appeared almost instantly, as if he’d been waiting all along, and instead of inviting Kurt in, he stepped outside and walked straight to the new cruiser.
“So here’s the new patrol car,” Glen said. He looked at it appraisingly. “What a beaut.”
“How did you know about it?” Kurt asked.
“Higgins told me this morning when I got off.”
“When Bard found out how much it would cost to repair the old one, he decided to just go for it all. The old one was breaking down anyway. I’d sure like to know how he wrangled the extra cash out of the town council.”
“Probably had to spend some time on his knees.”
Kurt smiled at the insinuation, but then he darkened at the next thought. “I guess Higgins told you the rest, too.”
Glen was peeking in at the dash, shading his eyes with his hand. “Huh? Oh, yeah—about Swaggert. That’s spread all over town by now. What do you think happened to him?”
“That’s what I came to ask you. Did you see him last night?”
“Nope, and that’s strange because he usually stops by Belleau Wood to bullshit for a few minutes. But not last night, I didn’t see hide nor hair of the guy. Could he have been thrown clear when he wrecked the car, or maybe crawled away?”
“No,” Kurt said, “no way. He climbed out the passenger door. Besides, we checked the whole area right up to the Belleau Wood property line. If he was hurt, he wouldn’t have crawled into the woods.”
Glen was standing now, leaning against the car door. He slipped his hands in his jeans pockets and looked thoughtfully into the trees behind the bungalows. “You think he bolted?”
“Not me. That’s the last thing Swaggert would do.”
“Well let me tell you what I think happened. I think he went after poachers and maybe got lost in the woods, or worse, got himself shot.”
“How would that explain the wrecked cruiser?” Kurt asked.
“Maybe one of the poachers was crossing the road same time Swaggert came around the bend; Swaggert can either dump the cruiser or run the guy down, so he dumps the cruiser. Then the guy takes off into the woods and Swaggert takes off after him, fixing to kick his ass and haul him in.”
Kurt gave the idea some thought. “Merkel’s field isn’t too far from Belleau Wood. Did you hear any shots?”
“No, but that doesn’t mean anything; Belleau Wood is huge, and I spend most of my time up near the house. I wouldn’t necessarily be able to hear shots as far down as Merkel’s field.”
“Yeah, but I just can’t see Swaggert getting lost in the woods. He’s a born pathfinder.”
“I don’t care if he’s Daniel Boone back from the dead. Without a compass, a guy can get lost quick as shit back there. Some of the thickest, hairiest woods in the state. And there’s always the quicksand on the other side of the Route.”
“Quicksand?”
“Hell, yes. The marsh is full of it. Animals sinking in the stuff all the time. Once I saw this beautiful ten- or fifteen-point buck go down in the shit. Funniest damn thing I ever saw—two big old antlers sticking up out of the marsh.”
Kurt pictured a different image, a
“Anyway,” Glen said, “that’s my two-cents’ worth. Swaggert chasing poachers.”
“Probably Stokes or one of his friends,” Kurt considered. “Jacking deer’s his bread and butter, next to dealing.”
“Might be a good idea to ask Vicky if he was home last night. Wouldn’t mean anything if he wasn’t, but it sure couldn’t hurt.”
Kurt nodded, trapped by a meld of thoughts. Just as he was about to ask Glen who owned the black sports car, the portable radio on his hip crackled and spat: “Two-zero-seven.”
“Two-zero-seven, go to 2-8-1-9, MSR 154; citizen reports possible signal 85.”
“Ten-four.”
“What’s a signal 85?” Glen queried.
“Missing person. We seem to be having a lot of those all of a sudden.”
“Yeah, a cop and a corpse. What next?”
“I’ll let you know,” Kurt said, and slipped into the new car.
Glen waved and went back into the bungalow. Kurt popped the portable back into the dash-charger, then started the engine and cut the wheel. He looked up then, turning a hard circle around the parking court. A quick slither at Glen’s front window caught his eye; the drapes pulled back from the inside, and he could now see a face behind the pane. It wasn’t Glen’s face, it was a woman’s. He stopped and stared, almost rudely. In the gap between the curtains he also could see a tapered slice of the woman’s breast, abdomen, and thigh; she was nude. But in less time than it took to frown, the drapes fell back across the glass, and the figure was gone.
Kurt drove away to his call, duped by what he’d just seen. This was the second time he’d caught a glimpse of the girl, and the second time Glen had failed to acknowledge her. He wondered what it was Glen didn’t want him to know.
Back on 154, he slowed to a crawl, driving on the shoulder and craning his neck to read the addresses on the postboxes. Finally he found it, 2819 stenciled across the body of a very large mailbox corroded by rust. He turned and drove at least fifty yards into the woods, along a typical tree-walled dirt road, until he came to the house.
